One important aspect of Roadway design is determining the amount of Earthwork necessary on a project. The execution of earthwork comprises four fundamental operations, viz., cutting, loading, hauling and filling. Except hauling, the costs of all the remaining three operations depend upon the character of the material. The haulage cost is a function of the weight of the material as well as the distance from the place of excavation to the place of fill. Since overhaul is an added cost and as it affects the economy of the project considerably, it is highly desirable to deal with the problem very carefully. This necessitates proper planning of movements of excavated soil of work site from cuts to fills so that the haul distance is minimum to reduce the cost of Earthwork. This may be accomplished graphically by means of a distribution diagram known as the Mass Diagram or Mass Curve or Mass-Haul Diagram. It is an important tool in Civil Engineering discipline used to compare the economy of various alternatives methods of Earthwork distributions on road or railway construction schemes to ultimately determine the most feasible option for Earthwork as far as economic viability and suitability is concerned to subsequently reduce the costs, labour, time and the complexity involved in the project. This paper aims at discussing the effectiveness and the suitability of Mass-Haul Diagrams in any operation of Earthwork involved in any Civil Engineering project thus undergoing a comprehensive discussion on its various aspects through suitable illustrations as and when required. At the end of this paper, the implications of Mass Diagrams using some popular computer softwares such as MS Excel and Autodesk CIVIL 3D has also been discussed, which considerably increases the efficiency of the project, that is otherwise lost in the preparation of the diagrams using the conventional methods involving manual plotting of graphs.
Mass-Haul Diagram, Earthwork, Cut & Fill, Haulage, Formation Level, Cost Economy
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